A known door handle apparatus for a vehicle (hereinafter also simply referred to as a door handle apparatus) mounted to a vehicle door is disclosed, for example, in JP2008-50870A. The aforementioned door handle apparatus includes a handle body, a frame member assembled from a vehicle inner side on a door outer panel that constitutes an outer surface of a vehicle door, and a bearing member made of resin and assembled on the frame member to hold a handle shaft portion of the handle body. The bearing member includes a pair of holding portions (grasping portions) disposed away from each other to define a holding void for holding the handle shaft portion. In addition, the bearing member is supported at the frame member so as to be rotatable between an assembly ready position and an assembly completion position. In the assembly ready position of the bearing member, the handle shaft portion is insertable into the holding void and is removable or disengageable from the holding void. In the assembly completion position of the bearing member, the handle shaft portion is restricted from being removed from the holding void. Therefore, the handle body is assembled on the frame member via the bearing member by a rotation of the bearing member from the assembly ready position to the assembly completion position in a state where the handle shaft portion of the handle body is set to the bearing member in the assembly ready position.
According to the door handle apparatus including the aforementioned construction, it is assumed that an excessive load is applied to the handle body in a vehicle rear direction. Such state may occur at a time of vehicle theft or during a normal door opening and closing operation where a user holds or retains the handle body with one's hand and fingers, for example. In this case, each of the holding portions of the bearing member is biased in the vehicle rear direction by the handle shaft portion of the handle body. Thus, the pair of holding portions may be elastically deformed in the vehicle rear direction. At this time, in a case where one of and the other of the holding portions separate from each other to thereby expand the holding void, i.e., an opening state of the bearing member is formed, the handle shaft portion of the handle body disengages or separates from the holding void and thus the holding of the handle shaft portion by the bearing member is released. In addition, the bearing member in the assembly completion position may possibly rotate to the assembly ready position by a load applied to each of the holding portions when the handle shaft portion of the handle body disengages or separates from the holding void. In this case, the holding of the handle shaft portion by the bearing member is also released because of the separation of the handle shaft portion of the handle body from the holding void. As a result, malfunctions such as an occurrence of looseness at the handle body and a disengagement of the handle body from the door outer panel, for example, may occur.
A need thus exists for a door handle apparatus for a vehicle which is not susceptible to the drawback mentioned above.